Two Sisters

“How did you find out?” she asked. “I mean, that April danced?”

“You mentioned her address when we spoke.”

She waited for more. When it didn’t come, she asked, “And? Did you talk to her neighbors or something?”

He smiled then, the corners of his full lips going up and pulling her gaze. Distracting her, even.

“I can’t be giving all my detective secrets away, now can I?” He arched one eyebrow, obviously prepared to say nothing more.

“Have you been to the club where she works?”

“Not yet. I was going to do that tomorrow. Is she still at the Esquire?”

Elizabeth nodded. What John didn’t know, he found out quickly enough, it seemed. “She’s been there about three years. Ever since we moved here.” She paused to gather her thoughts, then spoke quickly before she changed her mind, telling him about the conversation with Greg Lansing.

“What kind of trouble do you think he was talking about?”

“I have no idea.” She caught his look. “And before you ask, April is not into drugs. She won’t even take an aspirin when she has a headache.”

“Did she owe people money?”

Elizabeth laughed, a sound without humor. “Only me. She’s very generous with all her friends. If they need anything, they know they can come to her…and if she doesn’t have it, she usually comes to me.”

“Does she have any enemies?”

Elizabeth spoke reluctantly. “There is this woman…one of the other dancers. Her name is Tracy Kensington. She hates April even though April’s tried to be friends with her. Tracy was the top dancer at the club before April got there. Her tips went way down once the men saw April.”

He nodded without changing his expression, his next question throwing her off completely. “Where’d you say you lived before?”

The voice was still friendly and open, but for the first time, Elizabeth heard an edge beneath all the questions, an edge that reminded her of what he was. A Houston cop.

“Dallas,” she answered cautiously. What could he do with that tidbit of information?

“Did she dance there?”

“Yes.”

“Where?”

Elizabeth’s mouth turned dry, a lump the size of a baseball lodging in the deepest part of her throat. “At a place called the Yellow Rose.”

“How long was she there?”

“Years. We were going to college in Dallas and that’s when…when she started.”

His gaze narrowed, and she grew warm, the neckline of her blouse suddenly choking her. She tugged at the collar. God, she thought, all he had to do was ask her and she’d tell him. Everything. She closed her eyes for a second, the room spinning behind her lids. Taking a deep breath, she forced her eyes open and tried her best to look normal. The waitress saved the day by appearing with their sandwiches.

He noticed, anyway. “You okay?” he asked as soon as the teenager left.

“I…I’m fine,” she lied. “It’s just that I can’t quite believe April’s still gone. I can’t think about anything but her, yet I have piles of work waiting and a rush job to boot.”

“What exactly do you do up there in that big fancy office?”

Grateful he’d switched the subject, she used her cocktail-party version to explain what she did. He asked all the right questions, though, even seemed interested. She soon found herself telling him about the Masterson case in detail.

John shook his head. “Amazing. Here’s a guy who’s got all the advantages in the world—money, power—and he still feels compelled to go out and rob people. Makes you wonder, doesn’t it?”

She pulled a paper napkin from the container on the table and dabbed her mouth. “Not really. There’s always someone waiting to take advantage of people who can’t take care of themselves.”

They talked for another few minutes, then John called for the bill, which, despite her protests, he insisted on paying. Within minutes of stepping back into the humid Houston air, Elizabeth’s blouse was clinging to her back and a damp curl of hair had wound itself around her neck. While they’d been eating, enormous black thunderclouds had moved in and looked ready to burst any moment. The wind picked up and sent an empty pop can rattling along the gutter.

They hurried to Elizabeth’s office building. When they reached the main door, the rain still hadn’t started. John put a hand on Elizabeth’s arm to stop her from going in. She looked at him expectantly. He was tall enough that she had to tilt her head slightly to see him as he spoke.

“Listen, Elizabeth, I won’t do anything else unless you want me to.” She could read the sincerity in his eyes, hear it in his voice. “Where we take this now is entirely up to you.”

Thunder rumbled above their heads, and Elizabeth felt an echoing sensation in her body. She didn’t know what she should do. “I…I don’t want you to go to any trouble. I’m sure you have enough work of your own, and—”

He interrupted her. “I don’t have time for anything but the truth, so just say what you want to, Elizabeth. You don’t trust me. You can’t figure out why I’d want to help you when we’re basically strangers. Am I right?”

His words forced her to face facts. “Yes,” she said, “I don’t trust you. But it’s not personal. It’s just the way I am. The way I…turned out.”

“And there’s nothing wrong with that,” he answered, surprising her once again. “Women need to be careful these days. Hell, we all need to be careful. Like you said before, there’re a lot of sharks out there.” He paused, then, “But I’m a cop. I like to put the pieces of the puzzle together and make sense of it when it doesn’t look as if there’s any sense left. And I like to help people.” He held his hands out again, a gesture he tended to use frequently, she noted. “That’s it, pure and simple. I don’t have any ulterior motive.”

She looked into his warm brown eyes and didn’t believe a word he said. He did have a motive; everyone had one for everything they did, whether they knew it or not. The only question was if his was good or bad.

“I know you’re worried and I know you want your sister back. I understand that better than you think I do, believe me.” He reached out and touched her arm again briefly, as if to confirm his words. The gesture was warm and somehow reassuring. It scared her, but she believed him. “If you do this on your own, though, you may never find out what happened to her—until her body turns up.”

Elizabeth’s heart clutched. “Do you think she’s dead?”

“I don’t know, but unless I start to look, we may never know.”

Still she hesitated, torn with indecision. Should she trust him and allow herself to be indebted to him? Then she wondered why she was even debating the issue—she’d known the outcome when she’d started answering his questions, hadn’t she? This might finally be one of those things she couldn’t handle on her own. Her brain was screaming, though. Don’t trust him. He can hurt you. You like him too much already.

“If I don’t get involved,” he went on, “Missing Persons will do nothing.” His voice held regret. “I’m sorry, but the reality is they’re not going to get excited about this, Elizabeth. Not for someone in April’s position.”

She studied his face and read the truth, as painful as it was, in his eyes. He was right, she thought, her chest tightening as she remembered the woman she’d reported April’s disappearance to. Tuesday morning, Elizabeth had called her back and requested an official investigation, but she knew that route would bring nothing. The woman had taken the information, then quickly transferred her to the stolen car division. When she’d explained her sister had probably taken her car, they were even less interested than the previous department. And what about her own efforts? In the four days since April had been gone, Elizabeth had called the club, talked to April’s neighbors, her landlord and everyone else she could possibly think of, and they’d been no help at all. She’d even put up posters around the apartment building, but not a single call had come in. Did she have any other choice but depending on this man?

She nodded and said slowly, “Well, I guess it wouldn’t hurt if you just ask a few questions.”

As soon as the words were out, Elizabeth wanted to take them back. What kind of terrible mistake was she making?

He met her eyes. “I’ll do the best I can, Elizabeth. And you won’t regret letting me help, I promise.”

FRIDAY EVENING John pulled up to the curb and parked his car, staring over the steering wheel at the house where he used to live. The red brick glowed dully in the late-evening light, and he could see the azaleas had just been trimmed. The home was in a nice neighborhood, more expensive than he’d liked, but Marsha had insisted, saying her salary would make up the difference they needed. Now she lived there by herself—her and Lisa. And Marsha’s father gave her all the money she wanted—since John was no longer there to protest.

He’d fully intended to be here yesterday, but Marsha had called him that morning and put Lisa on the line. Her mother hadn’t changed a thing, and she’d been jumping with enthusiasm for her scheduled haircut. He hadn’t had the heart to insist she see him, instead. Dinner in the cafeteria and the bunk bed in his apartment didn’t hold the same appeal as a fancy beauty salon did to a little girl. Gritting his teeth, he’d simply given in to Marsha, deciding on his own to stop by this evening. It’d given him the time to catch Elizabeth at her office, but he hadn’t liked the situation. He wasn’t going to let two weeks pass without seeing his daughter.

His eyes went to the upstairs corner bedroom—Lisa’s room. A small lamp shone in front of the window. It was her Goofy lamp. She loved the damn thing. He’d got it for her last year when they’d taken a trip to Disneyland. For one whole week, he’d had her all to himself, and more than once the thought of never coming back had crossed his mind. He was a cop—he knew how to disappear—and the temptation had been awfully strong to take his daughter, find a quiet little town in California, change his name and start a new life. In the end he’d resisted, of course. Not because he didn’t want to hurt Marsha, not even because it was against the law, but because Lisa deserved better. She had the right to a father and a mother, regardless of how selfish and egocentric the mother happened to be.